Head of E-commerce Recruitment

Thanks to platforms like Shopify that bring high level tech to the masses, there has been a boom in the e-commerce space, which was historically reserved for companies with the budget and scale to build custom e-commerce platforms.

The result is an increase in e-commerce sector experienced candidates.

Naturally, there are a finite number of candidates with head of e-commerce level experience, as this role sites atop the pyramid.

In simple terms, the market for recruiting a head of e-commerce is competitive but over time, we expect this to somewhat ease, as those mid-level people progress further in the coming years.

We always ask the same things for a head of e-commerce hire:

-New role or replacement?

-Building on an existing ecosystem, revamping an old setup, or building from scratch?

Depending on the answers to the above two questions, you will quickly build a picture of whether you are fishing from the ocean or a pond on this search.

Making sure that you and your new head of e-commerce are aligned in both vision for your site, as well as the technology stack to support it, is a huge challenge to cover. If you’re not all on the same page, that’s where things get unstuck.

Our best advice: be clear on why you’re hiring, where you want things to go, and how much leeway the head of e-commerce will have, before you go to market.

Having a degree in marketing or a related subject, is likely to be the best traditional educational background, but we’ve also seen success with ‘qualified by experience’ candidates.

The head of e-commerce doesn’t need to be ‘hands-on’ technical, but should know their way around the various platforms, their applications, and their limitations, implicitly.

Naturally, a deep understanding of digital is required, typically from having risen through the e-commerce ranks and having personally worked at various levels within e-commerce.

Customer experience (CX) and a strong understanding of UI, UX and digital merchandising, are all crucial to this role.

Being analytical is also a must.

Firstly, have an informal call or video meeting, as soon as you possibly can. So much of this job is about vision alignment; make sure the personality fit is there at the start.

If you don’t mind a few home truths, why not ask the head of e-commerce about their opinion of your site and the shopping experience on it right now – a good way to make sure they’ve done their due diligence, see how diplomatically they can convey their constructive opinions!

Follow up with an in-person interview, ask them all about their successes and any changes they implemented to improve or overcome issues in the past.

After the interview, we think a head of e-commerce should present for 10-15 minutes, based on a brief you set after the first interview.

Follow this with a Q&A.

As it’s a senior hire, a third stage ‘rubber stamp’ meeting would be good, perhaps a coffee in an informal setting with other members of your senior team.